Ford and Purdue University Created a Cable That Fully Charges an EV in 5 Minutes [View all]
Ford may have just figured out a way to get rid of range anxiety once and for all.
The Detroit auto giant has teamed up with Purdue University to build a prototype of a cable that could fully charge an EVs battery in just five minutes. Theres still a lot of work that needs to be done, but the cable could help overcome one of the last major obstacles standing in the way of battery-powered cars achieving mass acceptance.
EV driving ranges may finally be reaching acceptable levels, but slow charging times still make some drivers wary. The last couple years has seen charging times improve dramatically, but theyre still not great, especially when compared to the five minutes it takes to fill up a gas-powered car. Right now, the best you can hope for is around 20 minutes when connected to a DC fast charger. Its even worse when youre home. The Ford Mustang Mach-E is one of the more in-demand EVs on the market, but it takes 11 hours to charge to full capacity at home, even when connected to a Level 2 charging setup.
This is due in no small part to the fact that current charging cables just cant handle the heat generated by the amount of power that would be needed to charge an EV as fast as gas can fill up a car. The cables connected to the Tesla Superchargercurrently the industrys best chargercan handle a maximum of 520 amps of current. Ford and Purdues solution: Come up with a better method of cooling charging cables.
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/news/ford-and-purdue-university-created-a-cable-that-fully-charges-an-ev-in-5-minutes/ar-AAQDXMO